ther side
of the door.

"Oh, hang it, what's this?" muttered Lupin, whose arms had closed, in
the dark, round a little, tiny, trembling, whimpering thing.

Suddenly understanding, he stood for a moment motionless and dismayed,
at a loss what to do with his conquered prey. But the others were
shouting and stamping outside the door. Thereupon, dreading lest
Daubrecq should wake up, he slipped the little thing under his jacket,
against his chest, stopped the crying with his handkerchief rolled into
a ball and hurried up the three flights of stairs.

"Here," he said to Victoire, who woke with a start. "I've brought you
the indomitable chief of our enemies, the Hercules of the gang. Have you
a feeding-bottle about you?"

He put down in the easy-chair a child of six or seven years of age, the
tiniest little fellow in a gray jersey and a knitted woollen cap, whose
pale and exquisitely pretty features were streaked with the tears that
streamed from the terrified eyes.

"Where did you pick that up?" asked Victoire, aghast.

"At the foot of the stairs, as it was coming out of Daubrecq's bedroom,"
replied Lupin, feeling the jersey in the hope that the child had brought
a booty of some kind from that room.

Victoire was stirred to pity:

"Poor little dear! Look, he's trying not to cry!... Oh, saints above,
his hands are like ice! Don't be afraid, sonnie, we sha'n't hurt you:
the gentleman's all right."

"Yes," said Lupin, "the gentleman's quite all right, but there's another
very wicked gentleman who'll wake up if they go on making such a rumpus
outside the hall-door. Do you hear them, Victoire?"

"Who is it?"

"The satellites of our young Hercules, the indomitable leader's gang."

"Well...?" stammered Victoire, utterly unnerved.

"Well, as I don't want to be caught in the trap, I shall start by
clearing out. Are you coming, Hercules?"

He rolled the child in a blanket, so that only its head remained
outside, gagged its mouth as gently as possible and made Victoire fasten
it to his shoulders:

"See, Hercules? We're having a game. You never thought you'd find
gentlemen to play pick-a-back with you at three o'clock in the morning!
Come, whoosh, let's fly away! You don't get giddy, I hope?"

He stepped across the window-ledge and set foot on one of the rungs of
the ladder. He was in the garden in a minute.

He had never ceased hearing and now heard more plainly still the blows
that were being struck upon the fron